On Sunday, Chris Wallace of FOX mentioned that the Republicans are upset at Ted Cruz. Specifically, he told Karl Rove that as soon as he announced that Ted Cruz would be a guest on his show this week, he received unsolicited “opposition research” against Cruz from certain un-named Republicans.
Naturally, the immediate assumption was that it had to be the evil RINO Republican Leadership who can’t stand a gen-you-ine conservative finally fighting back after the Republicans caved in to Obama on everything he ever wanted!!!! Indeed, the Daily Caller guessed that this must be the result of anger at Cruz “because Cruz and fellow Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee decided to devise a strategy to defund Obamacare without consulting Republican leadership.” And clearly, those RINO leaders don’t like the gen-you-ine Ted Cruz exposing their cozy relationship with Obama, right? Sarah Boo Boo Palin even demanded that Wallace disclose his sources so we can rid ourselves of their evil.
As an aside, Glenn Beck is calling for the “impeachment” of Boehner, McConnell, McCain and Lindsay Graham... oh, and Obama. Maybe we can add this to the list of charges?
Well, not so fast.
See, it turns out that the anger at Cruz isn’t coming from the Republican Leadership, aka the fringe right’s greatest boogeyman. No, it’s coming from, well, the fringe right.
Wisconsin Rep. Sean Duffy said Friday that the conservative House Republicans are angry and frustrated with Ted Cruz who has “abused” House conservatives. Apparently, he dun whipped them into a fightin' mood... made them go full retard... and then he refused “to get in the ring” when the time came.
Duffy notes that House conservatives were furious at Cruz all summer “as we were the punching bag and bullied by some of these Senate conservatives” with ads and fundraisers accusing the House of failing to defund Obamacare. This hurt them with their own followers who began to doubt their qualifications as
“[Cruz] sent out a press release while we were on the floor voting saying that, ‘Ah, we can’t really hold the Senate, we’re not going to filibuster, we’re not going to fight, and the House has to hold.’”Hm. And how did that sit with House conservatives? Said Duffy:
“I have to tell you what, you should have been on the floor or back in the cloak room. There was so much anger and frustration because, again, we’ve been abused by these guys for so long.”Tisk tisk, Sen. RINOCruz! Duffy thinks it’s time to “call them out” on their “hypocrisy” as “these big tough conservatives who know how to fight but will never get in the ring.”
I’m not surprised. From what I’ve seen, Cruz is an insider trying to trick the fringe into supporting him. He talks tough and attacks all the fringe’s enemies: the Apostate Rubio, Boehner, McCain, Graham, McConnell, the generic “establishment,” Mexicans, and sometimes Obama, and he panders to the fringe verbally (though he always throws in caveats the fringe overlooks). What he doesn’t do, however, is ever follow up his words with deeds.
That strategy worked for Obama – pander to the morons but don’t do anything that can be traced back to you specifically, and then run as a moderate in the general election. But it won’t work here. The fringe right is much more cannibalistic than the fringe left ever was and if you don’t lead every suicide charge, they will denounce you as a traitor. And that is what is happening now.
In fact, it looks to me like Cruz is in trouble. First, he gets accused of starting the “defund Obamacare” pointlessness to distract people so the RINO leadership can sneak through AMNESTY Ahhhhhh!! They’re under my bed! Now he’s being attacked openly for never going full retard with the rest. And more ominously, someone (probably a gen-you-ine conservative) is passing out “opposition research” against him.
Unfortunately for Cruz, I don’t think there’s a way to turn this around. The conservative fringe and the public are polar opposites and you can’t win a general election by being seen as pandering to the conservatives fringe. But Cruz has embraced them too closely to escape the association as all the other Republican presidential candidates have. So Cruz may soon find himself a man without support.
It will be interesting to see what his next couple moves will be.
23 comments:
Next move? Cruz should call for the impeachment of Chris Wallace.
Andrew.....All this inside politics makes my head hurt.
Once again, the left has successfully made the right's argument an either/or proposition: Either defund O'care or shut down the government. I'm not hearing from any repub, rino or otherwise, that the house has passed a 'bill' that totally funds the gov't, but defunds O'care. So, how could the gov't "shut down" when the house has passed a bill that funds EVERYTHING except O'care?
Until the repubs, all of them, start speaking like sentient beings, and let people know that the dems want to (inject everything wrong with O'care here), all the while stating that all the wasteful things the dems want the gov't to do (snail studies, LGBT educational opportunities in elementary schools, etc.) are funded just like the dems want, then once again, the repubs are left sputtering and blaming each other for something the dems are more than happy for them to take the heat for.
As far as I'm concerned, the jury is still out on Cruz, Rubio , et. al. First and foremost, as our buddy Jeremiah Wright says, "They are politicians first of all."
Some guys in the House (most vocally Peter King) and probably some guys on the ground (I haven't seen any recent polls) are unhappy with Cruz, but they don't matter. The overwhelming majority of conservative opinion makers (Rush, Palin, The National Review/Townhall.com, the Bigs) still strongly back him.
Cruz is young, charismatic and Hispanic and would be strong as a presidential candidate or very useful as a VP in 2016.
They could excommunicate Rubio because Cruz was waiting in the wings and more willing to tell them exactly what they wanted to hear, but right now, there is no one waiting in the wings to replace Cruz, so he is safe for the next three years unless he commits some apostasy for which plausible rationalization cannot be offered.
I'm just perusing headlines, which I know aren't the story, but do tend to be the story as the public understands it. What they say is that, if the government shuts down, it's Ted Cruz's fault.
El Gordo, LOL! That would be funny! :)
Patriot, I think the jury is out on all of them at well, though I think Cruz is playing with fire here. He's trying to lead a group of people who aren't acting rationally and he's hoping to be able to still come across as rational as he does it.
In terms of defunding Obamacare, Rand Paul said yesterday that it was impossible (making him the next RINO). I think he's right. And the party position should be "There's nothing we can do as long as the Democrats hold the Senate and White House... it's up to you voters to change that."
Anthony, I agree and disagree.
I agree that Cruz is safe until the next Messiah comes along. Until they find his replacement, they will tolerate him barring something bigger. But once they find the next one, he's toast.
I disagree about the "opinion leaders." The opinion leaders on the fringe are the mob and those people you mention are just trying to race to the front of each mob. When Cruz goes down, I think you will see a whole smear campaign suddenly appearing in the comments sections of their webpages and within a day or two they will all rush to the front of the mob and declare that they knew it all along.
The other thing is that Cruz is not stupid and he knows that being King of the 20%ers will not get him elected, so he needs to abandon them if he wants to be President... which seems to be his real goal. That means he will need to follow the other presidential candidates and adopt things that don't outrage the public. That's when it will all finally go wrong for him.
tryanmax, That's the really irony. Cruz has associated himself so closely with the crazies that he will be the guy fingered as their leader, even as they grow wary of his lack of craziness.
I think Cruz's problem is that he's playing by an out-dated rule book. He's stuck in 1990s political mode where one could talk a big game, but people wouldn't expect you to actually push the red button. But the people he's dealing with now expect him to push the red button over and over, just to entertain them. He doesn't seem to understand that.
Cruz has a new target this week. He's attacking McCain circa 2008 on behalf of conservatives. Sounds like an attempt to rally the troops. After all, McCain is public enemy number one to those people, unless it's Boehner.
Just a quick question..... How come we never hear of all these internecine battles within the Dem party?
Patriot, We do. Their feuds do get reported. BUT the difference is that they don't attack each other publicly, they do behind the scenes sniping which kind of dribbles out third person. The right on the other hand, loves to do this in public. They go to their favorite journalist and blast whichever conservative they hate at the moment and then talk radio runs with it. In fact, publicly attacking conservatives is an election strategy for the "gen-you-ine" right... it shows they ain't part of no stinking RINO establishment.
I can't for the life me understand why the Republicans keep running this circular gunfight among themselves...and publicly rebuking each other on a daily basis. Why aren't they spending their energies ripping the Dems with specifics. Every new day brings a new "revelation" about Obamacare. "Revelations" that we spent months and months warning everyone about, btw. Cruz is in for the next 5 /12 years, so he ain't goin' nowhere.
Kelly, That's worked for these people so far. Go back a couple years and ask yourself how often these "gen-you-ine" conservatives attacked Obama or the Democrats versus how much time they spent obsessively attacking other conservatives. I think you'll be shocked. The Democrats never get mentioned, Obama gets about 30% of the attacks, and the rest are aimed at various Republicans.
Bev, I think that's arisen out of the line that the fringe right has taught itself:
1. Everyone knows Obama is evil.
2. Everyone knows our beliefs are the only beliefs real Americans can have.
3. Everyone would vote for us if they were given the chance.
4. But they aren't voting for us. In fact, fewer and fewer are voting for us. Since it can't be our fault, and the enemy isn't strong enough to defeat us, then it must be traitors who are betraying us and keeping the public from seeing the real us.
When that is your thought process, you tend to look for the traitors in your midsts rather than the enemy, because you think the enemy can't stop you unless they get help from the traitors. Ergo, you spend your time burning witches. This is say thing that happened to the Nazis, the commies, and to various cults. The enemies within become more important than your opponent.
Bev, Let me also add that this has been reinforced by talk radio, which has learned that it is safer to denounce the unpure than it is to support anyone lest they end up being seen unpure and drag you down with them.
As for Cruz, he has one place he can go... run for President. And I think that's the plan. He's trying to get to the right of all the other candidates right now, he just wasn't expecting any sort of blowback for not being crazy enough. So now he has a choice -- get crazier and doom his future, or get saner and possibly doom his future.
Andrew - The whole "traitor" thing is driving me crazy. If I hear one more Republican use the word 'traitor" to describe ANYONE including...well...ANYONE, I am going to do serious harm to something like a stuffed elephant or donkey or something. There is just WAY too much use of the word "traitor" to describe non-treacherous actions. Call someone like Snowden a traitor, but stop calling everyone you disagree with a traitor!! HAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!
Okay, I am better now...
[Dear NSA, I would not really harm anyone. I am just engaging in a physically harmless rant like Rush LImbaugh...only not like him. Please do not audit my taxes or bug my phone. Sincerely, BevfromNYC]
Dear Ms. BevfromNYC...(Uhm, that's NOT where you're really from)..... Your recent online activity in a targeted site like Commentarama (BTW, we are well aware of this "Andrew" as he likes to call himself) does not concern us. It is the kitten issues that we have been getting increasingly more hits lately that have us "concerned."
This can all go away if you could just lean closer to your laptop screen.....a little to the left please.....there, that's it.........and speak clearly (not in a NY accent or a 'Texas' twang) the real names and current addresses of those commenters who purport to "prefer kittens" when speaking out against Dear Leader and the exalted ones.
A little closer please........
Bev, I feel your pain. Unfortunately, there seems to be no sign that the infighting will slow at any point soon.
Dear NSA,
You are aware of this Andrew? Excellent! Then you know that without me, the McDonalds corporation would collapse. You better be good to me or I'll cause massive unemployment.
Warmest regards,
Andrew
[Hey...psssst...NSA guy...pssssttt...over here! Yeah you! I've got names, if you promise to wait to audit me until I retire to implement my "special" retirement plan. Deal? Okay? Well, then...there's Fluffy and Mr. Sniffles and Sweety Puss...hmmm...and Frank. No wait, Frank is a monkey. I know there's more, really.]
Andrew - The whole "traitor" thing is driving me crazy. If I hear one more Republican use the word 'traitor" to describe ANYONE including...well...ANYONE, I am going to do serious harm to something like a stuffed elephant or donkey or something. There is just WAY too much use of the word "traitor" to describe non-treacherous actions. Call someone like Snowden a traitor, but stop calling everyone you disagree with a traitor!! HAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!
---------------------
Bev,
You are a traitor to Conservatism,
;)
Bev, Frank is a monkey? I had no idea. :P
Kit, LOL!
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